After two years of dealing with the unexpected and ever-changing challenges presented by the global pandemic, on balance Australia’s business leaders are cautiously hopeful that 2022 will be a year of improved business conditions, moderate growth, and further employment creation.

There is, as always, a wide range of views among CEOs about how the year ahead might pan out and 2022 is certainly not looking any easier to predict than is usually the case.

It is clear from the responses we received to our CEO survey, that business leaders are expecting their businesses to face fresh disruptions from COVID-19 in 2022. Businesses are moving to a living with COVID footing after two years during which, as a nation, we bought time by insulating and then vaccinating ourselves.

Just as there was no playbook for the initial two years, we will again be learning on the run during this new phase.

The cautious hopefulness of business leaders comes despite the seriousness of the disruptions they anticipate will characterise 2022 and is a vote of confidence in the strategies and investment priorities they anticipate deploying.

Our report identifies that CEOs are particularly focused on five interrelated areas. Read our full Australian CEO Survey 2022 Report for all the details.